On the progress made in safety assessment and severe accident management as part of the french Fukushima post-accident research programme
Résumé
The Fukushima-Daiichi accidents in 2011 underlined the importance of severe accident management (SAM), including external events, in nuclear power plants (NPP) and the need of deepen safety research implementing efficient mitigation strategies. For these reasons, the French General Commissariat for Investment has released significant additional resources to strengthen research in this area. Within this framework, several projects have been launched on the highest priority issues, in order to fill the knowledge gap and reduce the uncertainties still hanging over the main phenomena governing severe accidents and their management. Among them, the PERFROI, DENOPI, ICE, MITHYGENE and MIRE projects, led by IRSN, addressed remaining issues related respectively to fuel degradation and reflooding, spent fuel loss of cooling, fuelcoolant interaction, hydrogen risk and source term mitigation. For each of the projects mentioned, experimental and analytical activities were carried out to help understand possible accident scenarios and related phenomena, and to contribute to improving the safety of existing and future reactors. This article gives an overview of the main results of these projects. The achievements in terms of modelling severe accidents and improving severe accident management are presented and their applicability to innovative reactors, including SMRs, is discussed.
Domaines
Sciences de l'ingénieur [physics]Origine | Fichiers produits par l'(les) auteur(s) |
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